The impact of chlorine chemistry combined with heterogeneous N₂O₅ reactions on air quality in China

The heterogeneous reaction of N2O5 on Cl-containing aerosols (heterogeneous N2O5 + Cl chemistry) plays a key role in chlorine activation, NOx recycling, and consequently O3 and PM2.5 formation. In this study, we use the GEOS-Chem model with additional anthropogenic and biomass burning chlorine emissions combined with updated parameterizations for the heterogeneous N2O5 + Cl chemistry (i.e., the uptake coefficient of N2O5 (γN2O5) and the ClNO2 yield (φClNO2)) to investigate the impacts of chlorine chemistry on air quality in China, the role of the heterogeneous N2O5 + Cl chemistry, and the sensitivity of air pollution formation to chlorine emissions and parameterizations for γN2O5 and φClNO2. The model simulations are evaluated against multiple observational datasets across China and show significant improvement in reproducing observations of particulate chloride, N2O5, and ClNO2 when including anthropogenic chlorine emissions and updates to the parameterization of the heterogeneous N2O5 + Cl chemistry relative to the default model. The simulations show that total tropospheric chlorine chemistry could increase annual mean maximum daily 8 h average (MDA8) O3 by up to 4.5 ppbv but decrease PM2.5 by up to 7.9 µg m−3 in China, 83 % and 90 % of which could be attributed to the effect of the heterogeneous N2O5 + Cl chemistry. The heterogeneous uptake of N2O5 on chloride-containing aerosol surfaces is an important loss pathway of N2O5 as well as an important source of O3 and hence is particularly useful in elucidating the commonly seen ozone underestimations relative to observations. The importance of chlorine chemistry largely depends on both chlorine emissions and the parameterizations for the heterogeneous N2O5 + Cl chemistry. With the additional chlorine emissions, the simulations show that annual MDA8 O3 in China could be increased by up to 3.5 ppbv. The corresponding effect on PM2.5 concentrations varies largely with regions, with an increase of up to 4.5 µg m−3 in the North China Plain but a decrease of up to 3.7 µg m−3 in the Sichuan Basin. On the other hand, even with the same chlorine emissions, the effects on MDA8 O3 and PM2.5 in China could differ by 48 % and 27 %, respectively, between different parameterizations.